Already under fire for his drug policies, President Clinton revealed that a secret FBI memorandum said the government's anti-drug strategy "had never been properly organized." Clinton argued that the problems predated his administration.
Links: USA, FBI, ClintonB

1996 Oct 11

US FBI agents arrested 7 in West Virginia for plotting to bomb the national fingerprinting records facility in Charleston.
Links: USA, FBI, West Virginia

1996 Nov 15

Miami black commissioner, Miller Dawkins, pleaded guilty to bribery, corruption and conspiracy in attempting to shake down Unisys Corp. for $200,000. The case was opened under the FBI Operation Greenpalm. Also indicted was Cesar Odio, former city manager, who tried to skim funds from a city insurance contract. It was also uncovered that the city was $68 million in the red. Odio pleaded guilty in 1997.
Links: USA, Florida, FBI, Corruption

1996 Dec 9

More than four months after the Olympic Games bombing, the FBI posted a $500,000 reward. Richard Jewell, the security guard who was wrongfully accused of planting a bomb during the Olympics, and his lawyers negotiated a $500,000 settlement from NBC. NBC settled to avert a defamation suit.
Links: GeorgiaUS, USA, Olympics, FBI

1996 Dec 18

Earl Edwin Pitts, a senior US FBI agent, was arrested on espionage charges. He was most active as a Russian spy from 1987-1992. Pitts was sentenced in June 1997 to 27 years in prison after admitting that he'd conspired and attempted to commit espionage.
Links: Russia, USA, FBI, Espionage

The White House and the FBI clashed in a rare public quarrel after President Clinton said he should have been alerted when the bureau told national security officials that the Chinese government might be trying to influence U.S. elections.
Links: USA, China, FBI, ClintonB

1997 Apr 15

The Justice Department inspector general reported that FBI crime lab agents produced flawed scientific work or inaccurate testimony in major cases such as the Oklahoma City bombing.
Links: USA, FBI, Oklahoma

1997 May 1

In Colorado Ron Cole was arrested by the FBI at the Aurora House of Pancakes on charges of possession of illegal firearms and bomb materials.
Links: USA, Colorado, FBI

1997 Jul 16

Hundreds of FBI agents, some handing out photos in gay bars and hotels, blanketed south Florida in the continuing hunt for alleged prostitute-turned-serial killer Andrew Phillip Cunanan, who was suspected of killing designer Gianni Versace.
Links: USA, Florida, FBI, Fashion

1997 Aug 15

The US Justice Department decided not to prosecute senior FBI officials in connection with an alleged cover-up that followed the deadly 1992 Ruby Ridge siege in Idaho.
Links: USA, Idaho, FBI

The ashes of Eliot Ness, FBI agent, were laid to rest in Cleveland.
Links: Ohio, FBI

1997 Oct 1

US FBI Director Louis J. Freeh warned that Russian organized crime networks were growing and that they posed a menace to US national security. Russian crime syndicates were described to be forging ties with the Italian mafia and the Colombian drug cartels.
Links: Italy, Russia, Colombia, USA, FBI, Mafia

1997 Oct 2

In California some 200 police, FBI, IRS and DEA agents swept over 18 homes and business in Oakland, Hayward and San Leandro and seized 73 kilograms of cocaine valued at $70 million. Some 22 people were arrested in the drug and smuggling ring culminating a 3-month investigation.
Links: California, FBI, Drugs, IRS

1997 Oct 31

The FBI began an investigation into the use of pepper spray by law authorities in Humboldt County, California, after a video tape showed the spray applied directly to the eyes of protestors.
Links: California, FBI, Mad Police

1997 Nov 18

The FBI officially pulled out of the probe into the TWA Flight 800 disaster, saying the explosion that destroyed the Boeing 747, killing all 230 people aboard, was not caused by a criminal act.
Links: Air Crash, FBI

The FBI began Operation Black Widow to infiltrate the Nuestra Familia gang. This led to indictments of 22 members in 2001.
Links: USA, FBI, Mafia

1997

In Nebraska a state trooper pulled over William Arthur Kirkpatrick for doing 7 mph over the limit and found evidence of bank robbery and $1.8 million in cash. Kirkpatrick and his partner Ray Lewis Bowman were tried in 1998. The FBI suspected them for some 28 robberies that netted $8 million dating back to 1982.
Links: USA, FBI, Nebraska, Robbery

1997

Equifax Corp. spun off its ChoicePoint Division, which collected personal data on American consumers. ChoicePoint had purchased CDB Infotek in 1996 and DBT in 2000. Much of this data was sold to police departments and the FBI.
Links: USA, FBI, M&A

1997

Global Strategies Group, a SF brokerage firm under financial pressure to keep afloat, allegedly established a loan deal with the Gambino family mob for $500,000. The firm shut down completely in 1998 amidst an FBI investigation.
Links: USA, SF, FBI, Mafia, Corp. Scandal

1997

The Mike Newell film Donnie Brasco with Al Pucino and Johnny Depp opened. It was based on a true story of an FBI agent, Joseph D. Pistone, who infiltrated the mob in 1976 and wrote Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia in 1988.
Links: USA, FBI, Mafia, Books, Film

TimelinesA text-based site.

1998 Jan 14

Whitewater prosecutors questioned Hillary Rodham Clinton at the White House for 10 minutes about the gathering of FBI background files on past Republican political appointees. Sources quoted Mrs. Clinton as saying she knew nothing about any such collection of files.
Links: USA, FBI, Arkansas

1998 Jan 21

The FBI arrested dozens of prison guards and police officers in the Cleveland area following a 2-year sting operation on cocaine trafficking.
Links: USA, Ohio, FBI, Drugs

1998 Feb 20

In New York an FBI sting led to the arrest of 2 Chinese conspiring to arrange transplants of organs taken from the bodies of executed Chinese inmates.
Links: NYC, Medical, FBI

In South Carolina the FBI received a videotape made by Daniel Rudolph, brother of abortion clinic bombing suspect Eric Robert Rudolph, in which he amputated his left hand with a circular saw.
Links: Mayhem, South Carolina, FBI

In Riverside, Ca., Tyisha Miller (19) was killed by a hail of police bullets as she sat in her car with a gun. Her car had some 27 bullet holes. Miller died from bullets to her head and chest with a total of 12 bullets in her body. A coroner's report later said that she was legally drunk with traces of marijuana present. In May, 1999, four police officers were cleared of criminal charges in the killing. The case remained under FBI investigation for civil rights violations. In July officers Paul Bugar (24), Wayne Stewart (26), Daniel Hotard (23) and Michael Alagna( 27) were fired. Sgt. Gregory Preece (38), supervisor of the 4 officers, was told he would be fired July 27. Riverside agreed to pay Miller’s family $3 million in 2000.
Links: California, FBI, Mad Police

1999 May 16

The Justice Department said preliminary figures from the FBI indicated a decline in serious crime in 1998 for the seventh consecutive year.
Links: USA, FBI

1999 Jun 7

The FBI put alleged terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden and anti-abortion activist and accused doctor killer James Charles Kopp on the bureau’s list of the Ten Most Wanted fugitives. Kopp was arrested in 2001 and later convicted of killing Dr. Barnett Slepian.
Links: FBI, al-Qaida

The FBI was seeking the creator of Worm.Explore.Zip, a file-destroying computer virus which had hit some of the nation’s biggest corporations.
Links: Internet, FBI

1999 Aug 11

Buford O. Furrow Jr., a white supremacist, surrendered to the FBI in Las Vegas and confessed to wounding 5 people in LA and killing mail carrier Joseph Ileto (39). He said that he wanted his act to be "a wakeup call to America to kill Jews."
Links: USA, China, Labor, Jews, FBI

1999 Aug 25

The FBI, reversing itself after six years, admitted that its agents might have fired some potentially flammable tear gas canisters on the final day of the 1993 standoff with the Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas, but said it continued to believe law enforcement agents did not start the fire which engulfed the cult’s compound.
Links: USA, FBI, Texas

1999 Aug 26

Attorney General Janet Reno pledged that a new investigation of the 1993 Waco, Texas, siege would "get to the bottom" of how the FBI used potentially flammable tear gas grenades against her wishes and then took six years to admit it.
Links: USA, FBI, Texas

1999 Sep 1

Attorney General Janet Reno ordered US marshals to FBI headquarters to seize an infrared videotape containing a recording of FBI communications made during the 1993 FBI assault of the Branch Davidian sect in Waco, Texas. FBI officials had stated that no tape of that stage of the operation existed.
Links: USA, FBI, Texas

Henry Cisneros, former housing secretary for Pres. Clinton, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of lying to the FBI on payments to a former mistress. He acknowledged payment of $250k. His investigation took 4 years and cost $10 million.
Links: USA, FBI

1999 Sep 22

The FBI hit a big Mexican drug ring, formerly run by Amado Carillo Fuentes, with 93 arrests in the US and the Dominican Republic.
Links: USA, Mexico, FBI, Drugs, Dominican Rep.

Authorities worked with a US FBI team to unearth as many as 100 bodies of disappeared Mexicans and Americans near Ciudad Juarez. Drug traffickers were believed responsible. By Dec 7 eight bodies were recovered. Nine bodies were discovered after 3 weeks and initial estimates were deemed in error. In 2000 Vicente Carillo Fuentes, believed to be in charge of all drug trafficking in Ciudad Juarez, was charged with killing 10 people in the area.
Links: USA, Mexico, FBI, Drugs

1999 Dec 8

In Washington DC the FBI arrested Stanislav Borisovich Gusevm, a Russian diplomat, for collecting information transmitted from a bug in the State Department headquarters.
Links: Russia, USA, FBI, DC

TimelinesA text-based site.

1999

The FBI helped launch the 1st Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory (RCFL) to support federal, state and local law-enforcement agencies. By 2005 there were 6 such labs.
Links: USA, Computer, FBI

2000 Jan

In Malaysia terrorists held a meeting in Kuala Lumpur. The US CIA informed the FBI that Khalid Al-Midhar had a US visa. Midhar was later one of the Sep 11, 2001, terrorists.
Links: USA, Malaysia, FBI, CIA

2000 Feb 21

It was reported that the US FBI planned to open an office in Budapest in March at the request of the Hungarian government in order to help break up Russian gangs. The FBI would hire 10 Hungarian agents to work alongside 5 US agents.
Links: Russia, Hungary, FBI

2000 Mar 16

Independent Counsel Robert Ray said he found no credible evidence that Hillary Rodham Clinton or senior White House officials had sought FBI background files of Republicans.
Links: USA, FBI

2000 Mar

Baruch Vega, fashion photographer, was arrested by the FBI for money laundering and obstruction of justice. He had served for some years as a contact for the DEA to negotiate plea agreements with drug traffickers.
Links: FBI, Fashion, Photography

Jerry Andrew Amaro III (36) of Oakland, Ca., died of pneumonia due to fractured ribs. He had been beaten kicked on March 23 in the chest by Capt. Ed Poulson following his arrest by undercover cops for buying drugs. In 2009 the FBI opened in inquiry in the case. In 2011 Amaro’s family brought legal action against Oakland.
Links: USA, FBI, SF Bay Area

2000 Apr

The FBI issued an alert to American agencies warning of a possible al Qaeda attack. It was based on allegations by Niaz Khan, a Briton of Pakistani descent who turned himself in to US authorities.
Links: USA, FBI, al-Qaida

2000 Jun 9

The FBI began discussions on the "Serbian Badman Trojan" computer virus disguised as a movie clip and embedded in some 2000 commercial and home computers.
Links: Internet, FBI

2000 Oct 20

Egyptian-born Ali Mohamed, a U.S. citizen who'd served in the Army (1986), pleaded guilty in New York to helping plan the deadly U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa in 1998 that killed 224 people, including 12 Americans. It was later reported that Mohamed, a former Egyptian Army major, had served as an FBI informant.
Links: USA, Kenya, FBI

2001 Feb 18

Robert Philip Hanssen (56), senior FBI agent, was arrested for spying. He had allegedly passed information to the Russians for 15 years. It was believed that he had betrayed the construction of a tunnel under the Soviet Embassy in Washington. He pleaded guilty July 3 to avoid execution. His disclosures were later reported to have played a role in the execution or jailing of at least 3 Russians and threatened the identity of another 50 people. In 2002 David A. Wise authored: "The Bureau and the Mole." Hanssen was sentenced to life in prison on May 10, 2002.

The government announced the arrest two days earlier of veteran FBI agent Robert Philip Hanssen, accused of spying for Russia for more than 15 years.
Links: Russia, USA, FBI, Espionage

2001 Feb 22

President Bush held his first full-fledged presidential news conference, in which he defended his tax-cutting and budget-tightening plans and gave FBI director Louis Freeh a vote of confidence following the arrest of veteran agent Robert Hanssen on spying charges.
Links: USA, FBI, BushGW

2001 May 1

FBI Director Louis Freeh, appointed in 1993, announced his retirement. He served until June and then joined MBNA as a senior vice-president managing its legal and personnel affairs.
Links: FBI

2001 May 11

Attorney General John Ashcroft delayed Timothy McVeigh’s execution from May 16 to June 11 due to documents that the FBI had failed to turn over to the defense.
Links: USA, FBI, Oklahoma

2001 May 14

The FBI found in Baltimore another batch of undisclosed records on Timothy McVeigh.
Links: FBI, Oklahoma

Former FBI agent Robert Hanssen was indicted on charges of spying for Moscow. Hanssen later pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Links: Russia, USA, FBI, Espionage

2001 May 31

Veteran FBI agent Robert Hanssen pleaded innocent to charges of spying for Moscow. He later changed his plea to guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.
Links: Russia, USA, FBI, Espionage

2001 Jul 4

The US counter-terrorism group run by Richard Clarke sent a memorandum to Condoleeza Rice, national security advisor, that described a series of steps that the White House had taken to put the nation on heightened terrorist alert. It noted that all 56 FBI field offices were tasked in late June to go to increased surveillance and contact informants related to known or suspected terrorists.
Links: USA, FBI

2001 Jul 5

Pres. Bush appointed Robert S. Mueller III, a US attorney in SF, as the new head of the FBI. If confirmed he would become the 9th director.
Links: USA, FBI, BushGW

2001 Jul 5

Kenneth Williams, an FBI agent in Phoenix, Arizona, wrote to bureau headquarters that al Qaeda could be sending terrorists to train as student pilots. He urged the investigation of Middle Eastern men enrolled in American flight schools. [see Jul 10]
Links: USA, Arizona, FBI